Game Over: You Win
by TheUnsigned
Summary: Sans takes his final stand, knowing full well that this was the end of the line and if it was him, vs. determination he was going to lose. ...but nobody reset. (Spoilers ABOUND for Undertale overall)
1. RESET? NO!

It's more or less an accident that he drops the attack early, halfway between wanting to wipe the floor with the brother-murdering little freak and something about his present state of being that's keyed up and over-energized in a way that he's usually not; the reason for which he doesn't have the time to figure out right now.

* * *

He figures this is something he's done before because when he tries it, they make a good effort to scramble out of the way but instead, he is the one rewarded with a hateful frozen death mask.

* * *

Then, he's definitely sure they've got his number, how many times has it been? He's guessing about three as he can see them poised and ready as if they already know what he's going to pull.

So it begins.

Whatever the weird spike of energy he had to begin with is, it's wearing down now and he's carefully watching his patterns and their reactions every time he cleanly dodges another swipe.

They're figuring out all his tricks, little by little, one by one, and he knows they will try and try and try until he just can't take anymore. He has a few tricks left up his sleeve yet though. He waits, waits until they're almost at the end of their rope, almost dead... and then, holding his arms out to them in a parody of his brother that makes his SOUL pulse with a sadness and rage he squashes down, paints a lie of a true smile on his face, eyes tired.

"C'mon kid, just let's put all this behind us. "

There's a long hold of a pause.

The knife drops.

The bone attack falls on the surprisingly frail and defenseless form like a hot knife through butter. Blood splatters, the body slides slowly down them.

"GEEEET DUNKED ON!"

He's teleporting across the room, stuffing the soul into his coat and rifling their bag for whatever leftover monster food he can get into his mouth, nearly choking in haste (the extra spike of energy he supposes) before the bag will reset with them and the awful moment his memories go fuzzy and black and he finds himself standing there again piecing the puzzle together over again and again all the while inching closer and closer to certain failure.

Or that's how he was imagining it...for awhile.

He was left there however, panting returning to normal intake of air, sweat dripping and then cooling on his brow, stray crumbs and food drying to crust on his cheeks, tense pose dropping from a predatory crouch to one knee and then, finally, inertia setting in. Not to mention one hell of a 'magic hangover-indigestion' hybrid as his body began to wonder why he'd done all that to it when there wasn't any danger to speak of.

Finally, he just lay down to ease the ache in his side with his eyes drooping shut to drift off right there in a puddle of human remains and debris.

* * *

"Well, howdy there, Smi-oops, just Trashbag now. Or should you be just Trash? Because well you know, trash bags are generally around to make the landscape tidier."

Sans fumbled awake, trying not to make a show of how badly disoriented he was. "So I should just call you 'Shit' now because you both live in and eat it?"

Not his best comeback ever but it gave him a moment to gather himself, realization dawning that he was still in the Judgement Hall, sleeping next to a human body half-set with rigor mortis and hiding a soul under his hoodie while passed out on the floor in a total state. Trash? Actually pretty accurate. Also pretty ironic as for all the slobbiness Papyrus had (used to) berate him for, at least he'd never see THIS.

"Aw gee, did Trashbag forget how to take a joke as well as smile? Oh gosh friend, next you'll be telling me that you forgot how to laugh too. I'll be glad to help you out there. It kind of goes like this: 'Nyeh-heh-...'"

Flowey was not nearly as stupid as he was mean. He pulled himself into a crack in the tiles before finishing his sentence, the resulting attack bouncing the dead body high into the air and decimating what was left of the Judgement Hall floor.

"...Heh." Flowey's voice echoed away, one final jab as he fled the scene, sniggering all the way into the distance.

While Sans would have loved nothing more than to have turned the weed to mulch, the fact that he could still react that strongly to something - especially Papyrus - was heartening to say the least. The very, absolute least.

Right now? He didn't have a damn clue as to how to proceed otherwise. He hadn't been expecting to win. Now that he had, what the hell was he supposed to do?

Flowey took delight in kicking Sans when he was down and to those ends, Sans could surmise that the two of them were likely on the same page in some way when it came to what he was presently calling 'resets'. So either Flowey did not know what he had with him or had enough doubts to not call him out on it. He was willing to bet more money on the later than the former.

Hell, he hadn't been sure this thing was a human when he first encountered it. Maybe it was something that looked a hell of a lot like one, much like an animal that used a similar appearance to fool its prey. Or maybe EXACTLY like that as a simile. Best not to cause even more damage by bringing it near the other souls.

He hoped Alphys and Asgore could take care of what was left a while longer, if either was still capable of...well, one disaster at a time.

* * *

Sans skipped from Sentry station to Sentry station before finally phasing into Snowdin with a hiss of energy, right outside his front door. Taking a steadying breath and striding in, he headed straight for the kitchen. There was another pause before removing a container of spaghetti out of the fridge and opening it over the trash but after a moment checking under the sink instead.

The annoying dog was still under there, its tail tucked underneath it. "Hey...sorry. This is it. Better go find someone else to mooch off of if you can." he scooped the spaghetti into an unceremonious pile.

The canine looked up at him with limpid eyes and inched forward. It was still obviously going to eat the free food but seemed to understand without verbal communication that his beloved playmate and favourite pickpocket mark wasn't coming back. Sans shut the door and plunked the soul into the now empty container, giving a half-hearted triumphantly cruel grin at the fact that he had not washed it first. Let the beast sit in rancid spaghetti juice in his shed for a bit.

It was there he went next. The room was his last sanctuary against Flowey so much the safest place. He unceremoniously deposited the now red-glowing tupperware atop a pile of papers and then, well, one last thing to do at the moment.

This would be the hardest. So hard that he didn't bother to forgo the stairs, choosing instead to take them as slowly as possible, wanting to prolong the effort. He arrived at Papyrus' door, remembering this brother's insistence about the setup of their rooms.

"IF YOU WILL INSIST ON NOT TRAINING BROTHER, THEN YOU MUST TAKE THE FURTHEST DOOR SO THAT IF THERE IS AN INTRUDER, I THE GREAT PAPYRUS CAN PROTECT THE STRONGHOLD! BY WHICH I MEAN OUR HOUSE!".

He even kept the box of his bone attacks by the door, and that's what Sans grabbed first. He knew he'd need them again before this was over. Or even if he didn't, the sentimental value of his attack patterns was maybe what he was after. He could...celebrate his birthday.

And there it was, nothing left to do but scan the room for anything else he wanted to take. He would not be coming back.

After a moment he decided on a few of his favourite books (fluffy bunny and a couple by some human author Paps liked called 'Cliff') as well as the scarf, which he wound around his own neck.

The action figures remained where they were as a shrine. As one final afterthought he grabbed the one with the large sword. He'd give it to Alphys if she wanted it, to remind her of Undyne.

With that, he warped to his front door, turning one last time and whispering. "Hey, Paps. I'm going to Grillby's. Want anything?"

* * *

Sans knew he should have carried on to New Home almost immediately but couldn't face what he might find. Ironic that for all he had wanted to escape the timeline, now that he had, he didn't want to find out what the unknown held in store.

Maybe they were waiting for him to show up with the last soul or maybe they had thought him dead with the rest who had tried to take a stand. It would be a nice surprise for them when he showed up, maybe it would be nice to be around others, but for the moment he didn't want to hear their sympathetic moans and condolences either.

Not to mention, he also might not have survived another shortcut. He was painfully low on magic. and it was either finding something here or going back inside and nibbling on some dog residue.

Neither actually sounded appealing.

* * *

The bar was dark and a bit dusty but at least it wasn't the dust of the dead. Sans noted just how much of the light in the place had come from Grillby himself, which made him consider using his own magic to see by. That idea was squashed as his hunger reminded him of how low he already was and besides, for that matter, even though safe enough in a shop, he still wasn't interested in attracting attention from friend or foe.

Walking around behind the counter, he deposited a small handful of gold in the til. The whatever-it-was couldn't have harmed anyone in a shop but as it wasn't common knowledge, the terrified requests of families who ran establishments not to hurt their innocent families and to take their money and possessions had been heartbreaking. He owed Grillby a lot more than that for more or less feeding him for free over...how many 'resets'? He could make an educated guess but he still wanted to eat without throwing up.

He rifled through the cupboards for anything that hadn't gone bad that he wouldn't have to cook himself. Sans could follow a recipe well enough if he needed to but in spite of being a scientist, he was a worse chef than Papyrus (had been) when it came to inventing his own concoctions. Hell, he doubted he could make Temmie much work cutting up all that confetti.

He halted his thought process. All that 'no work' stuff. It was going to have to stop right now. It had been what had gotten him here and it would only continue to stagnate him now.

There was some cheese and some bread that had likely survived due to the lowered temperature in the bar and he made a few cheese sandwiches that were only palatable by drowning them in a mess of ketchup. He stowed a few bottles in with Papyrus' bone attacks and books and the figurine, reminding himself to stop by his hotdog stands for extra stock...or maybe storage.

"Well Papyrus." He raised his bottle up to the roof. "This here? This is why y' listen to your big bro. This is what hard work gets you. This is what bein' a hero looks like. I've saved our world, I've saved the human world...and countless others besides. An' what does it get me? Drinkin' stolen booze while hiding alone under a table in an abandoned bar."

He swigged from the bottle, spluttering it out of his nose as a wave of hysterical laughter hit him. He couldn't stop it, slumping against the back cupboards and chortling like he'd heard the best joke in the world until his sides ached and he was once again falling asleep.

He had no way of telling how long he'd been there, just that the fact that he was there would suggest that it was still this wretched timeline. It couldn't have been too long but he'd noticed some of the bread had turned to dust. He brushed it away and took stock of the situation. The food wouldn't last much longer which was motivation to keep going. He made a few more bone dry ( that was almost a pun which wasn't a bad sign) cheese sandwiches and forced them down best he could. It certainly wasn't the same as a nice meal of any kind but he was pretty sure a few shortcuts would take him to Hotland in short order.

Time to go.

* * *

With the core turned off due to a lack of coolant from Snowdin, Hotland was like a sauna. He stayed just long enough to max out his stock from the Sentry station and glad to see some hotdogs had survived. He ate two even though his HP was maxed out, just to get the taste of dust-riddled cheese sandwich out of his mouth.

He was happier than he'd ever been to see New Home, for about five seconds.

"SANS!" It was an Ice Cap. He couldn't remember its name but for something that had obviously spent a lot of time trying to get someone to notice him, he was certainly doing the best job of his life as he was almost instantly accosted by a wave (it was actually a pitiful little group but after so much isolation it felt like a wave) coming at him at once.

He had the swooping sensation of being picked up and for a second his heart leapt. It didn't quite falter as he realized who it actually was. Next best thing, really.

"Aw...hey Grillbz, I um...paid my tab." He didn't even mind when he started to sweat again, his clothes uncomfortable but his old friend paid him one last service, whisking him away from the mourners on the grounds of finding him a place among the refugees.

"So...Alphys and Asgore?" he began, trying to make good on his new 'no procrastination' leaf.

"Are going to be wanting to see you as soon as they can."

Sans nodded grimly. "Right."


	2. There are Other ways to Continue

Chapter 2

"Sans? Sans wake up."

His shoulder was given a gentle shake and he lifted his head just slightly without opening his eyes in the hopes of shrugging off the insistence.

He'd been woken up against his will by Grillby's gentle crackle pop of kindling voice many a time, but if it wasn't with his head against a hardwood bar with a splitting hangover and Papyrus making it worse by marching in to drag him bodily out then it just wasn't worth it.

"I brought breakfast." Grillby announced and the smell of coffee and oatmeal with crab apples and cinnamon was just enough to get Sans to open his eyes and sit up a bit.

"I'll leave the fire door up., but I have to get to work. I suggest you do try to see Alphys today." he added. This was the first time since his arrival Grillby had actively been more than just a personal bouncer and well, a bartender, at least in the listening department.

"Thanks Grillbz, you're a hero. And, ah, I'll think about it." He added to the rest.

"I haven't really had time to properly visit myself."

Sans knew by now that 'work' referred to the fact that the fire elemental, Burgerpants and the Nice Cream vendor made the rounds keeping the survivors fed and watered (or whatever) as best they could, but even so Grillby's comment made no sense. He knew Sans needed to come to terms with his situation and deliver a report to the two people in charge, but the flame elemental had made it sound like said 'business' was a very friendly social call. If Alphys had been into Grillby's in her entire life, he'd pay his tab in full.

"Hey…" he looked around, but his host had already left. Wasn't that supposed to be his move?

Instead he pulled over the bowl and started slowly eating, more out of obligation than hunger and put it down two bites in, deciding to begin the day instead with his new routine of going out and collecting the tokens that had been left behind by the mourners and well wishers. It gave his room the appearance of living in a shrine.

Papyrus would have been over the moon to have seen just how much he was missed. He wished he could have found some of his brother's dust but the chances were high that wherever the wind had taken it, it would have settled on something he loved. Papyrus after all had loved everything.

The thought gave him pause to smile, if a bit thinly. and then it fell when he spotted something among the blooms of a flower arrangement..

The god damned flower was here, and he knew that Sans wouldn't dare risk destroying one of his brother's memorials. So much for his theory of the stupid flower not lurking around a crowded space...but then this particular space was hardly crowded, not to mention Flowey had only shown up after the presence of plant withering fire was definitevly out of the way. He wondered if that had been some kind of deliberate 'you don't scare me' type of choice.

"Golly friend-o, I'm surprised you're still here."

A tendril snaked out to lift the leaf of an echo flower in a pot. Of course, now that flower would never repeat Papyrus' wish any longer but rather only Flowey's voice. He casually smashed the pot and its' occupant to dust with a bit of gravity magic, but of course the flower was already somewhere else.

"Now I am surprised you're still wallowing here, not when there's such a dire threat on the loose. and perhaps a seventh soul to get us all out into the world, but by gosh there was something else. What was it?"

Sans took a few deep breaths. Quite apart from not wanting to fly off the rails again in front of the flower, Grillby definitely wouldn't appreciate him razing his quarters after he'd offered it willingly.

"Aren't you excited about a baby? If I'm not mistaken, it's been years since poor old Trashbag's had a BABY to play with..." The flower popped its head back underground, apparently finished up with this week's torment, or perhaps just not willing to push things.

Sans was suddenly very aware of just why Grillby had been so insistent he visit Alphys.

Still being something of a scientist, Sans was aware that humans, like monsters used a variety of gendered or non-gendered words to refer to themselves. but in order to have children, the humans had to have a compatible set of internal parts. Monsters on the other hand, while depending on form could choose to birth their young in a similar way, did not necessarily have to go down that particular path. It was however generally acceptable practice to not be related by 'dust' and that the strongest of the two would carry around the developing soul.

Sans suspected that many, many monsters would under the circumstances be combining their souls, or attempting to. He was at least fairly sure he'd overheard something about Burgerpants and Catty. Sans actually cracked a smile at that. Take that, whatever-you-are.

Of course, Alphys would be left protecting the soul while Undyne charged into battle. Now that she was gone, well, that presented a problem. If humans had less options to conceive a child 'biologically' speaking, then they had a far better chance of bringing it to term on their own. A Monster without a second source of magic to nurture the baby well…

He sighed. Grillby was more correct than he realized; he probably should pay a visit to Alphys. Flowey was of course as astute with his needling - Sans did enjoy kids, particularly very young kids. They mostly just ate and slept and were easily amused. Right up his street. He would of course be delighted to have one around, particularly if it belonged to a longtime friend. If Alphys was a friend and was missing her partner, he would want to lend some support, especially now.

But as to Flowey's game in all of this, well it certainly didn't make anywhere near as much sense. He could have sworn, up until he had proof positive floating in a container in his shed, that Flowey himself had been in charge of the resets. All signs had pointed to the hypothesis that somehow the flower was testing the waters of what he could accomplish and manipulate others into doing. He wondered if he'd personally ever given up entirely.

If he couldn't reset, he wouldn't want to further decimate the population. Pushing Alphys into the proverbial pool or digging at his psyche was a dangerous game to be playing. Sans was pretty certain he had bested the flower more than once over the course of many, many resets. Seeing as the power to reset had been perhaps, passed? Well, this time it couldn't be undone for a different option and for all his soulless bravado, Sans was willing to wager gold to dust that at the end of the day Flowey was a coward.

He'd talk to Alphys. It was a start.

* * *

Sans found a map of the camp on the table. He wondered if Grillby had left it on purpose, but he was grateful for the fact that he didn't have to run into anyone he didn't want to. The doctor at least had never been a particularly social creature to begin with, so commiserating with her would be easy.

The next shock was the actual arrival in Alphys' home. As a fellow academic he was well aware of some of the nastier habits that could manifest. Organized chaos being chief among them, slightly off kilter eating habits and in his personal case the fact that apparently 'academic' was only a few letters away from 'alcoholic'.

That wasn't even counting the sheer magnitude of the horror show both of them had seen. Well in his case he was almost grateful for his patchy memory. Alphys could remember every detail of the amalgamates.

The sight of the pristine, well-ordered pup-tent of a lab then, came as a shock. Furthermore, there wasn't a ramen cup in sight.

"Alphys?" Sans called, a hint of nerves creeping up on him. Almost anything that was off-model these days was cause for worry.

There was a long, long pause.

"Doctor?" Sans tried again. He pulled out the figurine. "I um, I brought this for you. I thought maybe you could use it."

"Sans?" Alphys' voice was soft but there was no hint of her usual stutter, which he took as a good sign.

"Alphys I…" He looked in the direction of the voice, spotting a crest of yellow behind her box-futon he had mistaken for a pillow before.

She peered up at him. It was hard to gauge what she might have been thinking or feeling. She certainly wasn't crying but there was very real pain in her eyes that she couldn't mask. She'd lost Mettaton and she'd lost Undyne and whatever she could have been thinking or feeling towards either had clearly not been the way she wanted to end things.

"I um, thank you for coming to see me." She said at last and she sounded like she meant it, taking the figurine and cupping her claws to clutch it close to her chest.

"Hm. You shouldn't be alone right now." Sans continued. "I heard from Grillby that you're ah…"

She nodded. "I...I'm starting to feel like I can handle this, Sans."

He nodded. "I'm sure you can. Think you can let me have a look? Might be good to get another set of eyesockets here."

Once again she fell silent, simply choosing to nod. "When we're done that, think you're up for a further project?"

It caught her attention. "P-project? I um...heard you ah, killed…"

"Not sure if it's a human." He explained. "That's the short version anyway. I've been around for some of the early harvests and I can't be 100% sure that's what we're looking at. There's no need to get everyone worked up or destroy all the progress we've made."

Alphys swallowed a sob audibly at the sound of the word 'progress' and Sans felt like mimicking her. Nothing about this felt like anything close to 'progress'. Nevertheless, one of them had to keep going here and it was all the more important to keep an expecting mother calm.

He knelt in front of her, taking a look. She didn't look as far along as she should be, but not nearly as poor as he'd expected. "Someone's been helping you?"

She almost managed a blush atop the slight smile. "A-Asgore…"

Of course.

Sans nodded rather gratefully. He'd resolved to try and help the moment he'd figured things out, Flowey or no Flowey but his own situation wasn't exactly conducive to bolstering a young soul with magic. He was fairly sure he needed every drop.

"Listen, what do you know about a yellow flower?"

Alphys froze. Sans switched tactics instantly, smoothly lying his way out. "I mean, you spend time with Asgore, isn't that his favourite tea?"

Alphys stared him down, perhaps unclear as to whether she had an out or not. At long last she sighed, wringing her hands in front of her stomach and barring him from further observing the new soul growing in her. "You weren't talking about Asgore's tea really, were you?"

"No."

"You're talking about...the accidental experiment. The determination experiment. The one that no one else knows about."

Sans nodded again.

"You somehow know about it."

"It likes to come talk to me from time to time. Offer blossoms of wisdom."

Alphys scowled a bit but chose not to be deterred by his attempt at a pun. At the very least she allowed him and the stethoscope access once again.

"It talks to you." She said faintly.

There was a long pause.

"It talks to me too."

No big surprises there, Sans knew. Still, he was having trouble imagining the flower actively getting rid of his personal entertainment section.

"Don't listen too hard to him." He advised, trying to keep his tone light enough that it wouldn't cause her too much serious alarm but would at least ensure she understood the gravity of the situation.

He was surprised by her response.

"Actually, he's really been...very….nice. He wanted to know where it was that Mettaton and Undyne had...passed. He was suggesting a funeral even."

Sans was stumped. With no soul, just simple determination, the creature was unpredictable certainly but not entirely without patterns. His first thought was that they were actually in agreement but that was far too simple. Even trusting that Flowey would want 'something new' and that Alphys and any other disaster children that might come out of this situation were definitely that, he didn't trust Flowey further than he could throw him and that was without the use of his spatial magic. Sans slowly sat up, turning away from her. "Did you tell himwhat he wanted to know?" he asked, very slowly. He had to turn away to mask the distinctly non-conversational tone of the question.

"Of course I did. I don't want to forget either. They were my friends."

Sans stiffened. "I have to go. Take care, Doctor."

* * *

When Sans arrived, the lab was open but silent in the sort of horrible way that you didn't want to run afoul of someone's slinky pet cat that you knew was watching, just ready to give you a hard time when your neighbor was out and you were house sitting for them.

Sans knew the Amalgamates were lurking about, confused but probably hungry. A glowing blue bag of dog food trailed after him like a puppy and he hurled it down a hallway, moving swiftly as he could into the back rooms.

He knew Alphys, he knew scientists. She could give up on experiments. She could hide them. She would never, ever throw them out, no more than he would be able to or...what's his face had been able to.

He moved closer to his destination, soul clenching wildly. It was almost if he knew what he would find, regardless of what he hoped for.

The one room at the back of the lab was where his worst fears were realized, even if he hadn't yet pieced together the whole puzzle quite yet. Vines trailed up table legs, coiled around pried open doors, and knotted around cupboard doors. A room away he didn't need a ventilated fan to feel a cold chill as he took stock of pots of yellow blossoms, several pulled up by their roots. . The flowers were resilient, but a few dried leaves left a trail back and forth between rooms, a few speckles of dirt to show where hey'd been dragged along.

Deep in the lab there were smashed vials, mingling with the dirt and...

Flowey had wanted the dust of the fallen.

Flowey too had an idea to create some new life.

Sans sank to his knees , extremely grateful that he'd skipped breakfast that morning. If he didn't act fast, one flower was not going to be the issue anymore, and there's no way he would allow that to happen to anyone. Especially not Papyrus.


End file.
